Vikings Fall to Rams in 27-9 Wild Card Loss

Tonight against the Los Angeles Rams in a game relocated to Arizona, in front of a crowd that was half purple, the Minnesota Vikings lost their Wild Card playoff game 27-9 in utterly embarrassing fashion. It is hard to believe that this team was playing for the 1-seed last week.

Matthew Stafford and the Rams’ offense got the ball to start the game and promptly marched down the field for a touchdown. How did the Vikings’ offense answer back when they got the ball? They punted after 5 plays. Things didn’t get better as the game dragged on.

It was immediately clear that whatever triggered Sam Darnold’s regression in Week 18 had not been fixed.

It was immediately clear that whatever triggered Sam Darnold’s regression in Week 18 had not been fixed. If anything, he looked worse. Indecisive, missing open receivers, and holding the ball too long behind an offensive line that lost Brian O’Neill to a concussion, Darnold was sacked an astounding nine times.

While it's easy to lay the blame on Darnold, head coach Kevin O’Connell deserves a hefty portion too. Instead of calling up-tempo plays to get his floundering offense into some semblance of a rhythm, he called numerous long-developing plays. Early in the game he abandoned the run, but inexplicably returned to it when the team needed to score quickly.

The implications for the team’s poor performance the past two weeks will be costly. Darnold is gone, as is the interior offensive line. Brian Flores, despite the defense’s improvement in the second half, may garner fewer head-coaching interviews. Veteran safety Harrison Smith may have played his final game in purple. That is the business. It’s all about results and back-to-back games where the team fails to show up have consequences.

Did O’Connell had to win this game for the sake of his legacy? This loss doesn’t help to quiet the murmuring concerns that O’Connell is okay at coaching the regular season but can’t win big games. Now that the magic carpet ride of the 2024 season is over, fans will have time to debate that as we wait for free-agency and the NFL Draft.

It’s a shame things ended this way because it had been an unexpectedly entertaining ride. The problem with magic carpet rides is that carpets are not aerodynamic, when the magic disappears you don’t glide to the ground, you crash.

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